Luis Muñoz Marín International Airport |
Executive Air dba American Eagle ATR-72 and American Airlines aircraft at Luis Munoz Marin International Airport in April
2001
Luis Muñoz Marín International Airport in San Juan, Puerto Rico, is the island's main international gateway, and its main connection to
the United States. Intra-island flights fly between San Juan and various
local points of interest, including Ponce and Vieques. Its IATA Airport Code is SJU.
Located in the area known as Isla
Verde, the airport was, for many decades, known as Isla Verde International Airport, until 1985, when then Governor Rafael Hernández
Colón decided to name it after Luis Muñoz Marín, Puerto
Rico's first democratically elected governor.
Luis Muñoz Marín International has four terminals, designated B, C and D. A new international terminal (Terminal A) is
currently under construction.
The airport served as a Caribbean hub for Pan Am, Trans-Caribbean, and Eastern Airlines. It was
also the hub of Puerto Rico's international airline, Prinair, from the airline's
start in 1966 to 1984, when Prinair went bankrupt. In
1986, American Airlines (along with American Eagle) established a hub in the airport to compete with Eastern
Airlines.
In the past, the airport has been served by Mexicana, Aerolineas Argentinas, Lufthansa, Air France, British Airways, Viasa, Dominicana De Aviacion and many other important airlines.
Various celebrities have been welcomed to Puerto Rico at this airport, including Menudo in 1981, after the group came back from touring Mexico; the boxer Felix Trinidad in 1999, after he defeated Oscar De La
Hoya, and Pope John Paul II in 1984. Miss Universe 2003, Amelia Vega, held a press conference at the airport after
her arrival on October of that year.
On February 15, 1970, a Dominicana
De Aviacion DC-9 that was flying to Luis Muñoz Marín crashed shortly after takeoff from
Las Americas International
Airport in Punta Caucedo,
Dominican Republic, near Santo Domingo, killing everyone on board, including Puerto Rico's national women's volleyball team and Dominican Carlos Cruz, a former world boxing champion
who was going to San Juan for a rematch with Carlos Ortiz. See: Dominicana DC-9 air disaster
On June 24, 1972, Prinair Flight 191, which took off from Luis Muñoz Marín Airport,
crashed while attempting to land at Mercedita Airport in Ponce.
On December 31 of that same year, baseball star Roberto Clemente and his companions
died when their DC-3 crashed soon after take-off from Luis Munoz Marín during a relief
flight bound for Nicaragua. Neither the bodies of the victims nor the plane's
wreckage were ever found.
In 1983, a hijacked Alitalia DC-10 landed at this airport, under orders by the hijacker.
In 1985, an American Airlines DC-10 taking off from Muñoz Marín to JFK International Airport in New York overran the runway and nosedived into a nearby lake. Everybody avoided injury.
On May 9, 2004 an American Eagle Super ATR, flight 1450, crash-landed when of the tires popped. Twenty-six people were injured. No one
died.
A new terminal was inaugurated on May 20, 2004, with the inaugural flight being one from London,
England by Virgin Atlantic. Delta Airlines established a hub in the terminal, with flights to be added to San Diego, California, Santo Domingo and Punta
Cana, Dominican Republic as well as an already existing flight to New York being moved there and additional cities expected
to be added in the future. Aerolineas Argentinas announced that they plan to use the new terminal as a hub for flights to
Central America, North America and other points of the Caribbean, and Lan
Chile and Lan Peru are expected to
begin flying to the new termianl soon too.
Airlines serving Luis Muñoz Marín International:
Copyright note
Photo copyrighted by, and courtesy of, Mr. Joe Pries and his website, auctiontransportation.com
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